Torn: A Strange Week in London
by lostlikealice
Summary: A bittersweet study of love. Truth can be hard to swallow and mistakes can't be undone. The occurrences of a strange week in London. Chapter 6: The past is the past, everything comes full circle. The final Sunday edition. --Complete--
1. Depression: Life as Usual

A/N: All right. This is my third copy of this story. The poem lines (in bold/italic) are from a poem I've written randomly called "Cry for your Kisses" and it seemed to fit my happy (Hah!) little story. This should be the final copy, because I've edited this thing at least three times. Draco is viewpoint.

Oh, and one last thing.. Title=feeling of the chapter, Subtitle=_actual_ title. 

**__**

....If you felt what I felt.....

....I wouldn't be crying....

****

Depression

-Life as Usual-

I used to cry and hate my life.

Now I don't cry and hate it more.

I stare out of the window, where if this was the movies, raindrops like my tears would be dripping down the window. What tears? What rain? The sun burns brightly outside my window and all that is on my face is a frozen stare.

She eluded me. She. The woman I loved. Hermione Granger. I used to cry alone over her. Late at night, in the bathroom, almost every night. Because she wouldn't have me. She knew I wanted her so badly, and she wouldn't have me.

Way back when, in school. We sparred, glared, ignored one another-she even slapped me once. Every moment, every moment she knew I wanted her. I loved her. 

Unrequited love is bad. Silently refused love is worse.

Every time I saw her, I wanted her more. She made it often that I saw her. She called me a jerk, laughed at my pain. Sadistic, beautiful, twisted, charming bitch.

I couldn't help but be pulled helplessly towards her with her every tease, yet.. with every cutting remark she pushed me farther into hopelessness.

There's a knock at the door. I curse violently under my breath, and then I open the door.

It's her. 


	2. Temptation: Deal with the Devil

A/N: Okay, so I forgot a disclaimer. I own nothing; if I did, I'd be a hella lot richer than I am right now. And I wouldn't mess _my_ charries around like this.. Okay, maybe I would. Here it is, chapter two..

**__**

...If you knew what I knew....

....I wouldn't be dying....

Temptation

-A Deal with The Devil-

"Hermione, what are you doing here?" Back in school I might have had sarcasm, spite in my voice. Now I don't have the heart to sustain that illusion. "You.. don't have any reason to."

She laughs a laugh almost as quiet as a sigh. I look into those deep brown eyes and I'm almost pulled into her charms again. Then I pull myself away. Her once bushy hair is now like silk, smooth, like cascades of water flowing past her shoulders.

"Draco, Draco," she says. "So _suspicious_. Can't I ask a former classmate for a favor?"

I want to yell, I want to scream "Get out!" But.. I can't.

Finally I say, "What do you want? If you came here to--" I break off the rest: "torture me, wound me further, break my broken heart"... then manage, "make fun of me, you can go anytime you like."

"Like I said, I need a favor. Only you can do this for me, Draco..." She paces towards me, stands close to me, puts her arms around me, her face so close to mine. Her hand faintly, seductively touches the back of my neck; she leans towards my neck, and whispers, "Please; I'll do _any_thing."

So tempting... she's never been this outright before. I know, I know she's trying to use me, but... I smell sickly sweet perfume and the soft scent of her hair. Then I catch myself and pull away. "What," I ask, more a statement than a question.

"You may have heard from the grapevine that Harry and I will be married soon," she says, taking a step away from me.

That sends a pang into my chest, and I shake my head, not thinking of it. "No," I respond, scratching my head, looking away from her deliberately, measuring her. "I hadn't. What of it?"

She takes a few steps towards me, looks up at me, and says, "I want you to kill him for me."

"Who?" It couldn't be her fiancée she wants killed, she isn't that vicious, is she?

"Harry," she says, sounding surprised, then pleads, "You're the only person who can do it, Draco, I need you to. I'll do anything you ask... if you do this.."

I look away from her charming viselike gaze. "Why.. why would you..."

"Want him killed? It's simple, Draco," she says. She turns and paces, and for some reason, I'm thankful I can't see her face. "He knows who I am. He's beginning to suspect me, Draco..."

"Of what?" Who she is? He knows, we all know who she is. Maybe I even know the most because I've seen her dark side.. but I don't know.

She laughs. "Poor Draco. Poor, innocent Draco. A cunning Slytherin turned confused bleeding-heart. I'll tell you... only you, Draco, because you'll understand.

"He and I were perfect for one another. You know, in the three years since school ended and we graduated, Harry and I have had a relationship. However.." Hermione paces a few steps more, then turns. I see her face. A somewhat amused, cold expression. It freezes my heart like a blast of cold air for a moment, then my heart flutters back to normal. "He didn't know _everything_ about me."

My throat goes dry. I'm unaccountably frightened of this good-girl turned evil. It's strange; this draws me closer to her yet repels me, like before, but different. Was she always this way? "What didn't he know?"

She laughs, and I pause. My head burns with imagination of what she might say next. 

"I'm a Dark Witch. The high priestess of the Death Eaters; yes, we still exist, even without the Dark Lord. I veiled my appearance from all of them, even your parents, though I didn't need to. Because I was _behind_ the scenes," she pauses, savoring the moment, then continues, "at Hogwarts."

"When you were _eleven_?" I can't believe it. There's much now, I suppose, I should believe.. but my mind, bent in twisted love for this studious seductive girl, won't let me.

"I'm a Muggleborn, don't you forget. We _like_ power, and a girl like me given so much at such an early age.. Well, who wouldn't use it to their advantage?

"I became a Gryffindor--and later, friends with Harry, and it all came together. I started low but once the Dark Lord knew I was friends with _him_ he promoted me at once. I helped Harry through all of the things, including the Final Task at the Triwizard Tournament to lead him into the trap. Everything was planned so I, the mole, wouldn't be noticed." She sighs, grips a fist, releases it. "And now I can't do what I've worked so long to do."

"Kill him," I say, realizing the truth. "You want me to do your dirty work. Because you can't. You don't want to because.." I'm loath to say it, "you _love_ him."

"No!" She looks astonished. "In _love_? With _that_ idiot? No!"

"He can't be much of an idiot if he figured all of this out himself," I say. To think I'd be defending Potter from Granger.. to think any of this would happen.. to think I'd love her through all of this.

She looks unhappy with my comment. "I actually tipped him off by accident. Stupid me, talking to my lieutenants over the fire, thinking he was asleep. _Stupid_!" She curses, then looks at me with a curious gaze. Even though I know she's dangerous, cold-blooded, colder than I am, I see her innocence--or what I imagine to be innocence--in her eyes; that's what I fell in love with, for it was the opposite of what I was.. and am.

"So Draco, will you do it?" She gazes at me expectantly, with those wide, innocent brown eyes, and I fall. I fall into her charms and feel a twinge of anger, unexpected and rash. _How dare you treat Hermione like that? Do this for her, you love her, you've always loved her and you've always hated him.. You've hated Harry Potter since forever, do it!_

I blink, and realize her face, her beautiful face again is so close to mine. I'm taller than her, so she gazes up at me with those eyes, and says, "Anything, Draco. Do this one deed and you can have anything you want." She pauses, blinks delicately. "Even me." 

She angles her neck and kisses me. It's brief, but _every_ damn moment I cling to it because in my head, my twisted heart it binds me closer to her. It makes my torn heart love her more. 

And as she swiftly leaves, I touch my lips absently, realizing she's just broken open all the scars that have hardened around my heart.

Again, I'm bleeding for her.


	3. Indecision: Heartbreaker's Prey

A/N: All right, this is where it gets interesting.. Draco is considering Hermione's offer--rather deeply--and things happen. Odd ones. Here it is. Interested? Then read. The next chapter is the BEST one! ^_^ Domo arigatou! Mata aimasho! 

**__**

....If you knew what I knew....

....You'd actually listen....

Indecision

-Heartbreaker's Prey-

The taste of her kiss haunts me still, three days later. The smell of her hair.. it all tempts me.

Three days ago, the devil was in my living room... in the guise of my unspoken love. Or was she the devil all along?

What is this strange thing called love? Is it death? Life? Is it an infection that sneaks into your soul like disease to your body?

I've been infected far too long.

An owl arrives with a tap on the window. A far-too-normal barn owl, with a letter in its talons. I lean towards the window and open it. The owl hops once towards me, looks at me inquisitively, then drops the letter and pushes it towards me.

I look at the address, though I don't doubt who it's from. Yes, I'm right. Hermione. "To Draco" is written in her flowing script. The message is brief.

"_Draco--_

I'll come to hear your decision at noon. You had better prepare.

Love,

Hermione."

The last two lines burn my eyes with the contradiction. Cold, formal at first; then _love_. Love. If she loves.. if she loves anyone, least of all me, she wouldn't dare throw that word around.

I look at the clock. It's eleven. Then I look back at the address on the envelope.

I pocket the envelope, grab my cloak, and head out the door.

---------------------------------

"Harry?"

I knock at the door of the house Harry and Hermione share. I brush a drop of water off my brow, then look up. It's beginning to rain.

Oh, well. Hopefully Hermione isn't home. I look at my watch. 11:20. I have forty minutes.

"Just a minute," I hear from within the house, muffled. A few moments pass, then Harry opens the door. He's barely changed; same scruffy hair, scrawny; but new glasses, thin framed, rectangular instead of round. "Draco," he says, looking surprised.

"I'll get straight to the point. I want to talk to you about Hermione," I say.

He pauses tentatively. "What about her?" he says finally.

"You know damn well what I'm talking about, Potter," I snap.

He laughs, smirks. "Ah, just like old times."

I smirk back, but I can't waste a second of time. "I know all about her. Who she really is. What do _you_ know?"

He looks as if he's thinking, narrows his eyes, and nods. "Come in," he says abruptly. He opens the door fully and I step inside. 

A warm home. A fireplace. A place where in my impossible fantasies Hermione and I would live. Picture of their travels across Europe and a large group picture of all the Aurors, including them, are propped on a small table beside a tall lamp and an overstuffed armchair.

I sit in the chair while Harry squats in front of the fireplace, distractedly warming his hands. He stares into the fire as he speaks.

"She's been acting differently. Understandable for a woman who's about to be married," he concedes with a wave of his hand, "but not like this. Not happy, ditzy, you know.. hostile, wound-up, snappish."

"Maybe it's that time of the month," I say, the old familiar smirk settling on my face. I haven't in years.. since I lost her for good. The smirk dissolves off my face.

He avoids my comment. "Then I found her talking to someone in the fire late on Sunday night. She told me it was Auror work, but I didn't recognize the voice."

"An affair, then." Now I'm not jesting; just trying to see what he knows, so I can save time.

"With a Death Eater?"

I freeze.

"She's no innocent girl," he says, tensing at the fire, still staring. "She's a temptress. A deceptive _bitch_," he snaps. Then he relaxes, sags. "She's got me lashed in tightly, though. She's deceiving all of us at once. I think in some way we all knew, but just didn't want to realize it."

I look down at my watch. 11:35. "You may as well know, if you don't, that I love her."

He nods grimly. "You hated her enough to really love her. I always had a feeling.." He trails off, sits down at the hearth and sighs. "I'd die for her. In a second, I'd die for her."

Suddenly images of that day, when my soul bled almost as much as today overcome me. Our graduation.

Just like today, I was alone. My mother and father were Death Eaters once again--but the Aurors were back again. A week before, Death Eaters led an attack on the Ministry of Magic and the Aurors. Not surprisingly, my father had called a personal day. The Aurors, however, had been expecting them. A slaughter. The Dark Lord lost most of his troops.

And I lost my parents.

Parents? Sponsors would be more like it. Parental love, who needed it. They used their power when I needed it, and spoiled me. I didn't need their _love_.

But for some reason, when they were gone... it hurt.

And I was alone. My demeanor fell, my reputation collapsed. My "bodyguards," Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle, left me. No one spoke to me, not even that lapdog Pansy Parkinson. I was--and felt--off limits.

Hermione. She was even cruel back then. She talked to me, pretended to care. Hugged me, comforted me.

It wasn't me there. _I_ didn't exist anymore, not Draco Malfoy, the smug blonde smirking and double-crossing. No longer.

A victim of circumstance. I was born to cold parents, fell in love with a cold woman, lived a cold life in a cold world. Happiness? I wasn't happy. I've never been happy.

That day, Hermione graduated with honors, along with Harry. I was close, but my studies dropped when my sunny (Hah!) disposition faded. I didn't care about that anymore, life didn't matter. Only one thing did.. and it quickly evaporated that day.

Hermione celebrated her triumph by kissing Harry. No one looked at me, no one saw the pain in my heart. I've always been a good actor. Disgust; I simply projected that foolish "mudblood" act I did for years.

Ron Weasley and a Ravenclaw named Lyra Meioh were going out. Even Weasley had a girlfriend.

And I was _alone_.

We've both been silent for these past moments. Now I speak. Confessions pour out in my words. "She wants me to kill you for her. She came to my flat and seduced me. She told me everything, she's the leader of the Death Eaters now since you and the other Aurors destroyed _Him_, she's been one since she was eleven." I take a breath, close my eyes, and listen. I can almost hear Harry's shock. "Ten years of deception," I say softly with the realization.

Finally he speaks. "She's worse than I thought," he says. "So, Draco," he says in conversational but bitter tones. "What now?"

"I suppose there's one thing we can do," I say.

"What?"

"Kill the manipulative bitch."

11:41.


	4. Desperation: Low Noon

A/N: Thought last chapter was screwed up? Wait 'til you read this whopper. Longest chapter. My fave. I wrote this at a weird time of life, so that's why it's screwed. I love Draco, teehee! Then why am I torturing him so? I think it's habit. Well, here it is.. The plan is on its way, but as usual things never do go according to plan.. Not at all. 

Disclaimer: I obviously don't own HP, that's JK's job and I don't think she's doing a good job of owning it--giving it away to anyone who flashes money, for example, but I'm off track--and there's a Moulin Rouge quote in here that I didn't even notice for a _very_ long time. Anyway..

A/N2: If you're younger than thirteen or in general offended by violence, swearing (mostly the "f" word) and all that that entails, get away now. This may be your only chance to not be disturbed. Staying? Good. Don't blame me for any long term psychiatric trauma.

**__**

....But now that you don't....

....I cry for your kisses....

Desperation

-Low Noon-

It's noon.

She should be here. Should. She's not the type of person who's ever late.

Does she suspect me, or is she trying to make me panic?

"Relax." Harry sits in one of the armchairs in my humble flat. I could live in the manor, I _could_ live richly; but I don't see the point. The money rots away in the bank. Cold hard cash is exactly that--cold. Like everything else in my life, cold.

"She probably knows I talked to you," I say. I pace back and forth. "She probably had someone watching me. I know it."

"Don't be so paranoid. She'll be here."

"Then you'd better hide." I pace a few steps towards him, then stop. "The bathroom. You can hide there."

"Now?" Harry rises, blinks at me.

"Yes. Now," I say. He goes in and closes the door. At that second, there's a knock at the door. "Just a second," I say.

I open the bathroom door and whisper to Harry, "Have your wand ready. Come out when I say 'I don't know', all right?"

He nods, ready. "_Tasiratus_?"

I nod, close the bathroom door loudly. Then I open the door.

Hermione stands there, looking stunning in red. I smile nervously at her. For some reason, I feel vulnerable to her..

"So, Draco," she says. She steps in; her dress is more suited for an evening visit than a noon visit. The sun is dull and bright, and a similar light pounds inside my head. "Have you made a decision?"

"Come in and I'll tell you," I say, turn and sit down. She closes the door behind her. 

"So are you going to be smart?" Hermione asks. "Or will you make the wrong choice, Draco?"

"Well," I say, then continue with an extra edge, "_I don't know_."

Harry opens the door quietly--I can see him behind her. He tries to sneak up behind her, 

but she whips around.

"Well! Quite an unlikely pair of conspirators," she exclaims. "My fiancée and my little plaything." She smirks, then simpers, "My two _favorite_ boy toys."

"I can't believe this," Harry mutters. He gives me a significant look and I catch on. I stand, grab her arms, constricting her. She cries out in surprise.

"Now, dammit!" I yell. Harry stabs her in the neck with his wand, shouting, "_Tasiratus_!"

She goes limp in my arms. I try holding her up, then gesture to Harry to get the chair. He drags it over and I drape her into it. "I've got some rope in the kitchen," I hiss at him. "Get it. We'll tie her up."

Harry hurries to get it before she wakes up. The Tasiratus curse lasts long, but to tightly secure her to the chair will take work. Her head flops to the side, and a few strands of hair fall into her face. I brush them away then pause, staring at her peaceful face.

Harry comes out of the kitchen with the rope in hand. I look away quickly from her acquiescent expression and take a fairly good-sized piece. We begin to bind her to the chair. 

"Couldn't we do this with magic?" Harry asks somewhat critically.

"We could, but she'd be able to undo it much easier," I respond. "It may be slower but we'll hold her longer."

"All right," Harry says with more than a little doubt in his voice. Amazing--I'm using the Muggle method and he'd prefer the magic.

I groan. Harry looks up at me. Before he can question, I pull up my sleeve. "Look." Way back when, when I followed my mother and father and became a Death Eater, I was 

"branded." Now I show it to Harry in the crook of my arm; it's burning darker.

He looks half-disgusted, half-curious at it. "You actually were..?"

"Only for a short time. When my parents were alive, they made me do it." I push my sleeve back down. "It's probably because I'm near her. Or.."

"What?"

"They're looking for her." Sudden realization strikes me. "I'm sure she thought I'd do it, and then she'd have a big party or something. You're _still_ their worst enemy, you know."

"Lovely, this fame," Harry says bitterly. We finish tying her onto the chair, and I pace.

"She'll be awake in about five minutes," I say. "Should we gag her?"

"No," he says. "I want to ask her things. _Lots_ of things."

I laugh. "You want answers?" I gesture into the kitchen again. "Veritaserum in the refrigerator."

"You're kidding me." I shake my head. "You keep that around?" I shrug. "You're a remarkable one, Draco."

"So I'm told." I pull up a chair next to the unconscious Hermione. Harry goes into the 

kitchen and I hear him rummaging through the refrigerator.

"So, my love," I whisper to her. "My love, you're a witch of many talents. Love, you can make a man feel like the most important person on the planet." I sigh, kiss her cheek softly. "But you can, in the next moment, make him feel like the most foolish fool."

"You need to clean that refrigerator," I hear Harry say from within the kitchen. I jerk away from Hermione as Harry emerges from the kitchen with the Truth Potion. "Let's get her awake," he says. "I want to.. enjoy this."

It seems we don't need to do so, however, because she's beginning to come to. "Mmm," she murmurs.

Harry seems to have something like rage, rather than regret like me, festering inside him. 

He slaps Hermione across the face, snarls, "Wake up, _darling_."

Hermione opens her eyes wide, stars at Harry, and I swear I see fear in her eyes. Then she lowers her eyes, gives a low laugh. "My boy toys," she says. "What've you done to me?"

"Nothing yet," Harry responds. "But there's more to come, oh yes, much more."

The voice of reason tells me this is not normal behavior from Harry. "Harry," I say, "maybe this wasn't a good idea. I mean--"

"Draco," he interrupts, "I'm speaking to my fiancée right now. It's important. Honey?" he snaps at Hermione, then mocks her simpering tone. "We _need_ to _talk_."

"Draco," Hermione says desperately, watching me warily. "He's a madman, Draco, I've always loved you, you know that.."

"You bitch," Harry murmurs. "You bitch." He pulls a knife out of his pocket--I recognize it from my kitchen, a large thick blade--and presses it against her throat. "How would you like me to cut your lying throat, huh, Hermione? How would you like that, bride-to-be?"

"Harry," she pleads. "I did love you, I swear it. Draco was just.. a mistake, Harry, I love you.."

"Still lying?" He pulls away the knife. "Fine. Your choice." He produces the crystal vial of Veritaserum. "You won't be lying now."

"Harry," she pleads. "I've been mad, please just..." she looks down at the ground. "Trust me."

"Draco, plug her nose."

"What?"

"Do it." Harry unplugs the vial. Hermione looks panicked and clamps her mouth shut. I plug her nose and after about ten seconds, she begins coughing. By that time, Harry's shoved the potion down her throat.

"Now you should know," I say, "that she's not going to know what she's saying." I know this is his way of getting revenge, sadistically jabbing at facade of his love; he wants to hurt her, to make her weak and defenseless. But you _can't_ be awake during a Veritaserum trance.. at least, I _think_.

"I'll find a way." He wants to see the fear in her eyes. It scares me that he's like this, and doubts are starting coalesce..

Hermione suddenly slumps in the chair. Her eyes are open, head cocked back towards the ceiling, and I see her eyes are flat, dull.

A sudden thought grips me, and I say, "Did you ever love me, Draco Malfoy?"

"I've been fond of him, yes, quite fond of his desperation and constancy. I've never known what _love _is.."

"Love," Harry repeats. He looks at me strangely, and I look away quickly. "What about me, Harry Potter? Did you love me?"

"He was clueless to the world. Sure he was an orphan, but he didn't know pain. He was.. he was an _innocent_. That innocence attracted me, but.. romance and love, it seems.. like.. an _infection_."

I laugh sardonically. Harry doesn't notice. "So there's no way we can wake her up?"

"No. Well, we probably could give her a good electric shock and she may wake up."

Harry suddenly laughs--I jump, startled--and he turns to Hermione. "You're a potion buff, Hermione, how can you wake someone who's under a Veritaserum trance?"

"Electric shock and loss of blood are effective in awakening one from a Veritaserum trance," she quotes flatly.

He nods to me. "Good job, Draco, you were right." He pulls out the knife again, looking at his reflection in its silver surface. "Blood loss, eh?"

"Harry, you could seriously hurt her if you keep this up," I say. Then I remember I was the one who proposed her death by our hands. "Though.. it may not matter now."

He ignores everything I said, and slashes a deep red line across her wrist.

As if an electric shock is going through her body, she spasms from her feet up. Then her head snaps up and her eyes are wide, startled. She begins to cough. 

As she recovers, I look over at Harry. There's a strange glint in his eyes, one that scares me. "Are you, Hermione Granger, leader of the Death Eaters?" I ask.

"Yes," she answers, then her eyes widen with fear as she realizes she can't lie any longer.

Harry laughs, then asks, "Did you ever love either of us?"

"No." The blood from the cut drips down her arm, into her hands, staining the rope. She looks down, panicked, then desperation overcomes her face.

"Do you want to live?" Harry places the blade on her other wrist--a bit of pressure and she'll at least pass out from blood loss.

"Yes. I have to carry out the last wish of my master before I die," she says. The blood on her right arm is beginning to dry, and has stopped flowing. A superficial cut, but serious nonetheless.

"Was your mission to kill Harry Potter, no matter the cost?" I ask shakily. This is really scaring me, the look on her face. The way Harry delights in her desperation.

I hate to admit it, but I'm beginning to doubt, and I.. my love for her is still there.

"Yes. Since my first year at Hogwarts, I was to assist Harry Potter to each trap my Lord had set for him. After the destruction of my master, I had to take the job into my own hands and lure him myself." She looks appalled as all her secrets spill from her own mouth.

"And so you led me to believe that you loved me," Harry says. He laughs again, that same 

"I can't believe it" laugh.

"You meant for me to kill him," I cut in. "Would you have followed through with you promise if I had?"

"Yes. You've grown on me, Draco, and I enjoy having you around.. I would've taken you in and added you to the Dark Empire, so we could rise up and rule all wizardkind.. yes, you had potential, until you joined up with _him_." Her face is now resigned, and I'm in wonder. She wouldn't have used me and thrown me away? She had.. she had the _potential_ of _feelings_ for me?

"You bitch, you _bitch_," Harry mumbles. "You were mine, it was perfect, why would you--? I hate you. I hate you.." 

****

....You don't want to listen....

He sinks down, hugging his knees to his chest. He looks up at me and I see tears in his eyes. "Are you happy? She loves you. Not me. Happy now?"

"Happy? I've never been happy." I look over at Hermione, who's staring at Harry crying over her. A look that I can't describe overcomes her--a mix of pity and hate and 

frustration. "This was a bad idea, Harry," I say. "Let's just.. let's just forget this ever happened." I look over at Hermione, then begin to untie her wrists. "Will you turn on me if I release you?"

"No," she says, with a strange clarity in her eyes. Clarity like starlight, nothing like the dull light of the sun this day, this low noon.

"What in the _hell_ do you think you're doing?" Harry stands up, glaring at me through clouded eyes; rage behind his glare shining like the dull noon sun. "You and I started something and we're going to finish it. Don't take _her_ side, Draco."

Then he pulls a gun.

Hermione is quivering--and it makes sense, because only one of her wrists is loosened. Even if she got her hands out, Harry could shoot her dead on the spot before she could untie her bonded ankles.

I grab at the gun. "You idiot," I hiss. "What are you thinking? Someone will hear!"

Harry pulls back. "It shouldn't matter to you in a second, because you'll be dead!" His eyes are wild, his voice verging on hysteria. "If I can't have her, no one can, _especially_ not you!"

We struggle a moment more until both of us hear a sound. We both turn to look. 

It's Hermione, softly crying, crystalline tears dripping down her face. She can't say a thing--the potion grips her still. All she can do is cry almost soundlessly.

****

....You just want to talk....

Harry pulls the gun away from me roughly, and my hand smarts for a moment. He stares at Hermione. "Why are _you_ crying? _You've_ got _no_ right to _cry_."

"I didn't mean any of it," she says, tears still painting her face a flushed red. "I was immature and selfish, and I didn't know--didn't know what love was. And I wanted it so bad, but I mistook lust for love and power for wisdom and.. I've wronged you two so much."

Harry shakes his head, lets out a noise of surprise. "Do you really believe you deserve to live?"

She starts to cry again, but Harry pistol-whips her. She lets out a muffled cry, sobs louder. 

He barks, "Answer the _damn question_. Do you _think_ you _deserve_ to _live_?"

She looks up at me with that innocence like starlight shining out of her and a look I can't decipher, and says, "No."

****

....I know something's missing....

At that moment I realize what the look in her eyes was. The soul of a person who learned the way to the right path too late.

I see the bullet hit her in the forehead before I hear the sound. Her head's thrown back like whiplash and her blood spatters, hits the wall. Her body slumps back, and I rush over to her. I cup her chin and look into those starlit brown eyes. They're flat, dull, and the light of life is gone.

I hear a clunk of Harry dropping the gun, and I suddenly remember.

"You fuck." I step away from her, staring down at the ground. "You _fuck_." I look up at Harry with a hopeless defiance. I storm up to him, grab him by the collar, and seethe, "You _killed_ her."

He says nothing, just stares down at his shaking hands.

"You _shot_ her. You _killed_ her. Fuck. _Fuck_." I shake him by his shoulders. "You fucking killed her."

Harry laughs quietly, then says, "Well, Draco, isn't that what we came here to do?"

I pull up a chair by the window, and stare outside. 

****

....From this Primrose Path I walk.


	5. Guilt: Sick Realization

A/N: Okay, this is a reposted chapter; I forgot to put a disclaimer for the song lyrics near the end. It's not a songfic, don't worry about that.. it's just for effect. Anyway.. 

Disclaimer: Blink 182 owns "Adam's Song", Elton John owns "I Want Love", Foreigner owns "Cold as Ice", and Soft Cell and apparently Marilyn Manson both own the rights to "Tainted Love." I collect quotes like a packrat, so please notify me if I took something and didn't credit it.

****

Guilt

-Sick Realization-

That day has passed. The day after two broken men went to take revenge on their lost love has come.

It's another day with my love gone forever.

I haven't slept, quite obviously, because dreams follow things like this, and I don't think I'd be able to handle dreams of yesterday. Of her.. and of her death.

I can't bring myself to look at her. I can't. She's _gone_--gone before I could spirit her away from Harry and all this pain I have. I don't think I--I don't think I have the courage to stare into those flat, dead eyes that once held light so like starlight--

But only as she just confessed her heart to me. To us--to both of her murderers.

I suppose it would be called a crime of passion--but _Harry_ is the one who held the gun, who shot the gun, who--who killed her.

She's still tied to the chair with the one loosened wrist from when I attempted to save her. 

But I failed.

And she paid for my failure with her death.

The news owl arrives at my window. I laugh; I forgot it was Sunday. I open the window and the owl drops the newspaper to me. I stare at the front page with the sober irony.

"AURORS HARRY POTTER AND HERMIONE GRANGER TO BE MARRIED"

I suppose I shouldn't let Harry see this.

Harry looks up at me from his leisurely spot on my couch. He's slept there since about an hour after he.. you know. "What is it?" he asks. "Let me look."

"You don't want to see it," I say quite honestly. "I didn't want to, you don't."

He gets up and looks over my shoulder before I can cover it up. "Oh." I look up at him, and pity, but still anger, overcomes me. He looks haunted, like a man who's seen too much.

"Sorry." Lame, I know, but what else can I say? There's nothing for two men who've conspired to kill the one woman they both loved to say to one another. If you can think of something better, you're more tactful than I am.

"Why should you be sorry?" he says. "You didn't kill her." I suddenly get the feeling that Harry's drifting away from the here and now, reality. "You weren't the one holding the gun."

"Yet I _still_ feel guilty," I say. "I still _am_ guilty."

"You don't know guilt," he says accusingly, but not harshly--even so, it still cuts like a knife. "You _don't _know guilt."

"I know more than you'd think."

Harry looks away, nods. "Goodbye, Draco." His tone is strange; far away, distant. I'm suddenly gripped with a sense of doom. 

****

....Don't walk away/Before you know how I feel....

"What do you mean, _goodbye_? You can't--you _can't_ leave me here with _her_ here."

He looks at me, shakes his head. "I'll be in the bedroom. 'Bye."

I finally resign to misunderstanding. "Goodbye, I guess." Harry leaves the room absently, his steps seeming almost to be floating.

"Hell," I say to myself. I go to lay on the couch, then my body is gripped with sleep. Suddenly I'm exactly where I don't want to be.

My twisted, cold subconscious.

Dreams, dreams of starlight and vials and a dull sun shining over all of it; a desolate, cold 

landscape with starlight pure, like innocence.

The voice of my love..

"I was immature and selfish.. didn't know what love was... wanted it so bad.. I've wronged you two so much."

A half gasp of pain, then an angry voice. "Do you _think_ you _deserve_ to live?" 

Answered with a shaky, but fully honest answer. "No."

Blood, then sound shattering through my senses.

I see two Hermiones, the one I desired and the one I loved, in front of me. They both speak at once; it echoes.

"Can't I ask a former classmate for a favor?.. I didn't mean any of it... So, Draco, have you made a decision?..."

"No. No. No. No." Starlight slowly builds up until it blinds me, and the echoes grow fainter as both Hermiones become one and she glides away from me with a look so torn on her face. I reach out for her.. but she's gone.

As my eyes snap open--

****

....Don't look away/Before you hear what I say....

--That's what I remember. She's gone.

Irrationally, I wonder if Harry has left me here. That leads me to the train of thought of how strangely Harry is acting, and as if some strange manuscript was obscure to me, I receive the information with sudden clarity.

In a panic I get my sluggish body up to track with my mind and quickly arrive in the bedroom.

Harry is lying on my bed with a slightly intoxicated look on his face. He looks at my partially panicked expression and laughs. "What's wrong, Draco? Don't worry about nothin'.. everything's all right, yeah, everything's fine.."

I groan as a bottle of pain medicine on my nightstand catches my eye. I pick up the bottle and shake it.

It's completely empty.

"Hell," I say. "_Hell_."

Harry laughs. "Yeah, painkillers all right. Killed my pain.. my thoughts; now I have only about.. hmm, a couple minutes, hopefully."

"Harry, stop joking around," I snap. "Did you--have you taken all these pills?"

After taking a short look, he says, "Yeah. That's about right."

"You'll die!" I say, on the verge of hysteria. Of course, I knew it, I knew it, voices scream in my mind.

He laughs, then looks at me soberly. "That, Draco my friend, is the point of suicide, isn't it?" He nods to me, lays back a little with one arm propping him off the pillow and the other across his stomach.

Anger hits me harder than before. "You fucking _coward_," I seethe. "You're doubling the death rate here, you fucking _moron_, I'll be left with two dead bodies in my flat because _you're_ just a fucking _coward_!" I scream that last word, and I'm then surprised by my own voice.

He seems about to argue, but looks like he's just had a clear realization. I pause and watch him as I realize he was about to vomit, which he now does.

"Great. _Fucking_ great."

------------------------------

Harry's been puking his guts out--in my bathroom, of course--for about fifteen minutes now in intervals. He bitterly rants to me in between.

I perch on the edge of the tub, staring down at the tiles. The harsh electric light hurts my eyes, which are already stinging with tears of frustration and desperation.

"We talked all the time, especially in bed. We'd just talk, and she seemed so sincere and honest, I--dammit, I just loved her so _damn_ much and I _killed_ her, I shot her." The sick look I'm now used to seeing overcomes his face, and I look away and wince as he vomits again. Surprises me, there must have been more pills in there than I had thought. He'd have puked up all of them by now if it had been half-full.

He recovers, looks at me, and I can tell we're nearing the end. His breathing's rougher and he's becoming a pale shade that I can only call deathly. "How does it feel?" I ask gently.

"How does it feel," he repeats, shaking his head. "How does it feel? It feels like guilt. Like betrayal. Like.. well, like you'd figure suicide would feel like, Draco. It hurts, but not half as bad as life."

"Maybe life would have been better if I had gone with her and killed you."

"Maybe," Harry says bitterly. "Either way I'm the dead one."

He pukes one more time and suddenly collapses down, falling onto the tiles. His head, luckily--or unluckily, I guess you could argue in his case--hits carpet. I take this opportunity to flush the toilet. This scene's sick enough as it is; those investigating will appreciate the action.

"Is it gettin' worse?"

He's fading fast, so I kneel beside him. "You're an Auror, you're dignified, so you've the right to them; what are your last words?"

"I lived my life the way everyone said I should but I still ended up here, it still ended this way. I lived for her, I loved her, I would've died for her.. but I loved the innocent one, the one I.. that's the one I want to remember, not the siren; the one I talked to." He laughs weakly. "Good luck, Draco.."

"Good luck to you, Harry," I say softly.

****

....Don't turn your ear/Because I have something to say to you....

"I... I forgive you."

As I leave the room, I feel him die. I pause, but continue on in respect.

As I sit on my bed in a silent flat, I realize I am in a house with a dead former ally against my love, who also sits dead in the living room.

It strikes me funny that I begin this strange week in a silent flat, and ended it in a silent flat--but in a silent flat splattered with blood.

****

....Taste my life, taste my tears....

I flip on a Muggle radio I've become fond of and listen. I hear bits and pieces as I crawl over to the knife laying on the ground, then crawl back onto the bed.

I never thought I'd die alone/I laughed the loudest who'd've known..

I can't love shot full of holes/Can't feel nothin'/I just feel cold..

You're as cold as ice/And willin' to sacrifice your love..

I love you though you hurt me so..

....Taste my love, taste my blood.

Blood as red as the evening dress she wore that low noon dripping off my wrists, more 

bitter but twice as sweet...


	6. Death: A Deceptive Cadence

****

Death

-A Deceptive Cadence-

The Daily Prophet

****

THREE PEOPLE FOUND DEAD IN LONDON FLAT

by Trista Morgaine

Today three people were found dead in a London flat. They were identified as Harry Potter, his fiancee, Hermione Granger, and a known Death Eater, Draco Malfoy. On autopsy, it was found that Harry Potter overdosed on pain pills, Draco Malfoy slit his wrists, and Hermione Granger died from a gunshot wound to the head almost instantly. A gun is a type of metal wand Muggle use, so the Ministry is still curious to why such a thing was used.

One finding took a major blow to the Aurors when a Death Eater tattoo was found on Granger's body, as she was a seasoned Auror. On investigation, a list of some known and some unknown Death Eaters was found in her purse as the Ministry, it has been heard, will not hesitate to apprehend each and every person on that last.

A source who wished to remain unknown told the Daily Prophet and the Ministry that Granger "ran the whole group and had since the Dark Lord was destroyed." Exclusive to the Daily Prophet, we have a longtime friend of both Potter and Granger's, and highly respected Ministry official, Ron Weasley to comment on this baffling situation.

"I can't believe that Hermione was a Death Eater, nor that she was one since both Harry and I had met her. She was both Harry's and my best friend. I can't believe Harry would do anything like this either, two weeks from his wedding day. We had our scuffles with Draco Malfoy, but I never would have thought three of my graduating class would have come to such a tragic end all together, so young. It just doesn't seem like it couldn't be the end, could it?"

However, it is the end; the tragic end of three young people's lives. But this end is still shrouded in mystery; will we ever know what happened within those three days within a London flat, or will those stories lay dormant forever within those walls? Only time will tell..

**__**

I love you, Hermione.


End file.
